


The stars that don't shine

by Chthonia



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alien Mythology/Religion, Alternate Universe - Canonverse Legend, Bedtime Stories, Canonverse myth, F/M, Gen, Planet Naboo (Star Wars), Storytelling, Varykino, reylo child, reylo daughter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-30
Updated: 2018-09-30
Packaged: 2019-07-14 03:52:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16032410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chthonia/pseuds/Chthonia
Summary: A bedtime storyAn ancient legendA bittersweet memoryA love written across the stars





	The stars that don't shine

**Author's Note:**

> Written as part of the 2018 Reylo Fanfiction Anthology, with the theme of 'Celestial Bodies'. Thank-you to the RFFA mods for your encouragement, feedback and for all the work you put into the project.

* * *

 

"Mama, will you tell me a story?"

Rey pulled her daughter close. "And what story do you want me to tell, little star?"

The child bounced on Rey's knee. "Kira and the missing prince!"

Rey smiled to herself - this would be the sixteenth night running of telling this story. And she knew she would happily tell it another sixty times, no matter how tired she was from the day’s teaching, because her daughter was _never_ going to go to bed hungry and lonely after staring at the sky and having to make up her own stories.

She leaned back against the stone wall of the villa, still warm from the day's sun. The first stars were emerging through the dusky haze, their reflections wavering in the lake below, just as they had on that night she'd first come here with Ben. 

_Ben, enfolding her in his warmth as they'd watched the moons rise and he'd murmured a litany of stars in her ear: Orith, Bideva, Ka'Lyndriel…_

She shook her head back to the present. To the Lyndriel who'd been born of that night and who was now frowning up at Rey in impatience.

She started with a dramatic whisper. "There's a woman in the sky. Can you see her?"

"Yes! She's…" Lyndriel sat up straight and pointed a chubby finger at the sky. "…there!"

The constellation of Kira was low in the sky, but its brightening form was clear.

"Do you see her head?" asked Rey. "And her arm?"

The little girl nodded vigorously, her loose hair tickling Rey's nose. "And her heart. That's the bright one."

Rey smiled. "And why is that?"

"Because she was in love!"

"Well, yes, she was. But she wasn't just in love; her heart was full of love. She loved her queen and her planet and dancing in the rain."

That last bit was Rey's embellishment, of course, but who wouldn't love dancing in the rain?

"Do you remember the queen’s name?"

Lyndriel pouted. "I thought __you__ were telling __me__ the story."

Rey ruffled her hair. "All right, then. But you have to settle down."

Rey gazed up at the sky as Lyndriel wriggled on her lap. On a night like this, she could almost believe the constellations meant something beyond a psychological need to see order in randomly placed stars. They had meant something on Jakku, the Nightwatcher slithering across the sky year by year and R'iia's crown pointing her way home when she’d scavenged too late. But then she'd left those markers behind for an ever-shifting galaxy.

Myth was important, though. How would she have survived Jakku without her own?

Lyndriel's hand found hers. "I'm settled now."

"Let's get on with the story, then."

At first, Rey had been nervous about storytime. The only storyteller she'd ever seen on Jakku had been old Bobbajo the Crittermonger, and he had always seemed so strange it had never occurred to her that just anyone could tell a story, that parents all over the galaxy did every night. It had been Ben who had done so in the early days, but now she could slip into Story Voice without a second thought. Especially when this was the sixteenth telling in sixteen nights.

"A long, long time ago-"

" _ _How__ long, mama?"

"A __long__ time. A long, long time ago, Naboo was ruled by Queen Shiraya."

"We have statues of her!"

"Yes, we do. They were your great-grandmother's statues." Rey found the idea a little strange – the moons would circle the planet whether or not people prayed to a goddess to guide them. But her Naboo students seemed to find them reassuring, and Lyndriel's familiarity with the stories helped her fit in, despite her uncivilised Western Reaches mother.

"Now, the queen had six handmaidens, just as Queen Yaré does," Rey continued. "And one of the handmaidens was called Kira."

"Can I be a handmaiden when I grow up?"

"If you eat your protein and work hard, then maybe you can. Because Kira had to train for a long time to become a handmaiden, but once she was ready she was the fastest runner and the best hunter and the fiercest fighter on the world."

"Except for one."

"I'm coming to that. You see, Kira couldn't stop training just because she'd become a handmaiden. She needed to make sure she _stayed_ the fastest runner and the best hunter and the fiercest fighter on the world."

"Like being a Jedi!"

"Exactly like being a Jedi. So, early every morning, before the three moons set, Kira would go for a run by the river. She loved breathing the cool air, and hearing the birds sing, and running so fast that not even an Ikopi could catch her.”

“But one day, as she was running back to the palace, she heard footsteps behind her. And she could hear them getting closer, even though she was running almost fast enough to fly. So she ran faster, and faster, and faster. But the person behind her came closer and closer and closer - and just as she reached the gates of Theed the stranger ran past her and disappeared into the city."

"And he was wearing a hood, so she didn't know who he was!"

"Am I telling this story or are you?"

"You are. But stop missing bits out!" Lyndriel's imperious glare, Rey had long since decided, had to have come from Ben's side of the family.

"All right. So whoever had chased her was wearing a hood _and_ a dark cloak, and Kira had no idea who it could be. But she was afraid that they might be a threat to the queen, so she spent the whole morning looking. But she couldn't find any sign of the person in the hood."

"Until the next day."

"Until the next day. Because when she went out for her morning run, the same thing happened. She heard footsteps behind her. She ran faster and faster and faster and the footsteps got closer and closer and closer and the other person ran past her just as they got to the gates. But this time she didn't spend the morning looking for them. She went straight to the training hall and threw herself into her exercises, because she was determined to catch the hooded figure if they appeared again."

"So the next morning, when she heard the footsteps behind her, she let them get closer, and closer, and closer – and then she dropped to the ground, and rolled, and jumped to her feet so she could _grab_ them."

"Yes!"

Rey grinned at her daughter’s enthusiasm.. Run-and-roll was currently Lyndriel's favourite game, apart from demanding stories told to her exact specification.

"But the hooded figure didn't want to be caught. It just somersaulted over her and ran for the city gates, and before it disappeared into the streets it turned around and bowed to her."

"Well, Kira was _furious._ She stomped back to the palace and had her breakfast and went to the training hall with the other handmaidens, and just as they were about to begin the door opened and- who do you think walked in?"

"The prince!"

"That's right. But she didn't know he was the prince then. She just knew it was the same person who had been chasing her, because as soon as he saw her he bowed to her, as if he was making fun of her because she hadn't been able to catch him. So when he took off his cloak, she didn't notice how broad his shoulders were or how his hair framed his face or how his dark eyes shone just like the queen's. She just picked up her staff, bowed to accept his challenge and ran at him.

"And he fought with the power of a Cerrabore and the grace of a Tusk-cat, but she met him blow for blow. They fought up and down the training hall for three hours while all the other handmaidens stood against the wall and watched. And both of them were bruised and sweating and gasping for breath but neither of them would give way to the other. Until Kira tripped on something that wasn't there, and before she could regain her balance he'd pushed her to the ground and taken her staff."

"He cheated!"

Rey smiled. She’d had that argument so many times with Ben.

"Well, she said he'd cheated. He said they hadn't actually set any rules. And then he offered to show her what he'd done if she'd meet him the next morning."

"And she went, and she beat him."

"Well, not on the first day. The prince had been training at the Jedi temple, which is why she hadn't seen him before. And he thought she had enough of the Force that he could pass on some of what he'd learned, even if she wasn't strong enough to be a Jedi."

"Why would he do that?"

"Because he liked her, and wanted to spend more time with her."

"Because she was pretty?"

"I'm sure she was. But more importantly she was strong, and brave, and clever. So they started to train every morning, and he would teach her how to feel what your opponent was about to do-"

"Like we were learning last week! And I was the best!"

"You did very well, Lyndriel, but no one is good enough to stop learning. Not even-" _Not even your father_ , she'd almost said.

"Not even me. And not even Kira. Who was beginning to find she liked the prince too, even though she could never beat him. And then one day she distracted him and managed to knock him down and take his weapon."

"How?"

"Well, while he wasn't paying attention she got under his guard and-"

"But _how_ did she distract him?"

Rey was glad the evening had darkened enough to hide her blush. "Er, maybe she said there was something behind him."

"Hmpf. I'd _never_ have let that distract me."

"I'm sure you wouldn't. But maybe he wanted to be distracted, because he kissed her.

"Just like that?"

_It had been just the two of them in the palace, come to see the new training area that had been set up in the largest reception rooms. They'd tested it, of course, Ben swinging the training sword wildly while she spun her staff and knocked him back again and again. Until she'd shrugged her wrap off her shoulders and knocked the sword from his fingers while he was staring. And then she was lying on her back with his fingers in her hair and his breathing had mirrored her breathing and-_

"Yes. Just like that."

"But it wasn't that simple because he was a Jedi and she was a handmaiden, and neither of them was supposed to be kissing anybody."

"Why not?"

"Because in those days Jedi weren't allowed to marry."

"Why not?"

She asked the same question every night. Perhaps because the answer was so ridiculous.

"I think they thought that loving one person too much meant there wasn't enough love for everyone else. That it would make people selfish."

"That's silly."

Rey sighed. "Maybe it wasn't silly when they had to hide being in love. Because they had to meet in secret, and that meant they had to lie about where they were going and what they were doing when they should have been doing something else."

"And lying is wrong."

 _Yes, lying is wrong,_ she should have said. But if lying was wrong, shouldn't she have told Lyndriel the truth about Ben? And hadn't she been wrong to pretend that she wasn't seeing him holding out his hand to her in the mess room, in the _Falcon_ , in every cramped base they'd camped in? Or to sneak away to find him when everyone had told her not to? Because if all that had been wrong, surely she should regret doing it?

Her daughter was _five_. She could lie about life being simple a little longer.

"Yes, lying is wrong. So if I ask you if you're tired and ready for bed, will you tell me the truth?"

"Mama! You have to finish the story!"

"All right then. So… a few weeks later the prince had to go back to his Jedi training, and Kira could go back to her morning runs without having to lie. And at first they would send messages to each other, but after a few months Kira heard from the prince less and less often, until at last he stopped contacting her at all. 

"She must have been sad about that."

"I'm sure she was. But she was also a handmaiden, so she kept training to be the fastest runner and the best hunter and the fiercest fighter on the world, and worked with the other handmaidens to protect the queen."

"And then one day Kira was running by the river and she heard the prince's footsteps behind her, and this time she didn't run faster, but stopped and turned around and let the prince run into her arms. And he was thinner than he'd been before, and he looked like he'd been ill, but he also looked as happy to see her as she was to see him."

"But the closer they got to the palace, the less happy he looked, and when the prince, the queen and the handmaidens met for dinner that night, he wouldn't even look at her. The queen gave a speech welcoming him home, and he stood up, and raised his glass – and suddenly his lightsaber was burning in his hand and he swung it at the queen!"

Lyndriel squealed and hid her face in her hands. Rey covered her daughters hands in her own.

"But the prince had told Kira how to watch people, and she had been watching the prince even though he had been ignoring her, so as soon as he moved she pulled the queen back and his lightsaber only grazed her arm. And before he could attack again Kira was standing where the queen had just been and he lifted up his saber…but when he looked into her eyes he couldn't kill her. And then the other handmaidens attacked him and Kira took the queen to another room. But when she came back, he was gone and three of the handmaidens were dead."

"Why would he want to kill his mother?"

That was the hardest thing for her daughter to understand – perhaps this was why Lyndriel wanted this story again and again and again. Because there was no explanation.

 _‘Why did you kill your father?’_ She had flung that question at Ben so many times.

"Because while the prince was training to be a Jedi, he'd been tempted by the dark side. He'd become an apprentice to a master of the dark side, and his master had asked him to prove his loyalty by killing the queen."

"He'd become one of the bad people."

Rey smiled sadly. "No one is ever wholly good or wholly bad. But he'd chosen the bad side of himself. And Kira grieved almost as much for that as she did for the friends who he'd killed."

"Why?"

_He'd appeared to her so many times after she'd fled, those dark eyes boring into hers as he'd stretched out her hand. She'd had to force herself to turn away._

Rey squeezed her daughter's hands. "When you share your heart with someone, you can't stop caring about them even if you want to."

They sat in silence for a minute. Onoam was rising over the lake, the moon's light a pathway across the dark.

Rey continued the story. "But even though she didn't want to fight the prince, Kira knew that she was the one who had to go after him, because she was the fastest runner and the best hunter and the fiercest fighter on the world."

_She'd known she would have to face him, and the thought had horrified her. And he had sensed her reluctance, and knowing that he'd known her fears had only stoked them. And then he'd brought it all down from the inside, ships flaming through the skies as millions of Finns burned. And he’d reached out to her one last time, adrift in an escape pod, and she'd known she couldn't leave him to die no matter how little he deserved to live._

"And she did find him."

 _He'd barely had the strength to stand. And as they’d held each other on the_ Falcon's _scruffy bunk, he'd rested his head on her shoulder and she'd known she couldn't take him back to face death at the hands of the Resistance._

Rey swallowed. "Kira did find the prince. But when he saw her, he ran at her with his saber blazing red and his eyes burning yellow with the dark side. And she had no choice but to fight back, even though what she really wanted was to drag the man she'd loved away from the darkness.”

"She loved him, and he tried to kill her."

"I think he must have loved her too, deep down. But he'd given up too much to the dark side, and it had pushed his love into the shadows. He only saw that his love for her had stopped him doing what his master had told him to do. He wasn't trying to kill her; he was trying to kill the love in his heart, because he thought it made him weak."

"That doesn't make sense."

"No, little star, it doesn't. But when someone is taken over by the dark side, they think a lot of things that don't make sense." And Rey would give everything she had to keep such a thing from ever making sense in her daughter's world.

"So she fought him, but even though she was the fastest runner and the best hunter and the fiercest fighter on the world, she didn't want to kill him, and he was strong with the dark side of the Force. She tried to disarm him, or to injure him just enough that he couldn't fight, but he was slashing and stabbing and striking so fast she could barely see. And then he cut off her staff arm and there was nothing she could do against him."

"That's why Kira in the sky only has one arm."

"That's right. He could have killed her then, but when he saw her lying at his feet the dark side left him and he was horrified at what he'd done."

"That was a bit late."

Rey smiled. "I suppose it was. But he didn't kill her. He carried her back to the palace and she died in the queen's arms. And to honour her sacrifice, the queen sent her across the moonlight bridge and gave her a place in the sky."

"Did Kira forgive him, do you think?"

"I don't know. I think she might have been sad for him, because he'd got himself so lost. But it was his choice to go that way."

_'Don't do this, Ben. Don't go this way.' She'd pleaded with him in Snoke's throne room, but he'd still been in thrall to the dark then. It had torn her heart to turn away._

Lyndriel pinched Rey's hand. "Finish the story, Mama."

"Whether or not Kira could forgive him, the prince couldn't forgive himself. He begged Queen Shiraya to let him follow Kira across the bridge. As his mother she could not condemn him, but as his queen she could not pardon him for what he had done. So she laid her hand on his head and let him go. And if you look carefully, you can see him besides Kira – a dark patch with no stars and no name because the queen decreed it should be forgotten."

"But he's there, isn't he? Even though we can't see him."

"Maybe especially because we can't see him."

"I think she'd like to have him there."

"I think so too."

Lyndriel snuggled sleepily in her arms, and Rey felt that old ache for the arms that should have been holding her through the night. One day soon, her daughter would have to find out the truth about her father: Lyndriel wouldn't have Rey's nineteen years of idolising perfect parents. But at least her parents would be real, even if her father was just a gap in the stars.

 _Come home. She needs you here._ I _need you here._

She felt the lightest brush on her cheek.

_I can't. Not just yet._

_Ben?_

She could feel his arms around her now, as real as they could be if not as real as she needed them to be.

_It doesn't have to be you, Ben._

_It does. No one else saw into Snoke's mind as I did. No one else can trace the source of his power. And anyhow, I couldn’t live in a Jedi school -.I'd just end up telling them that the Jedi have unrealistic expectations and that they're all going to fail._

Rey smiled. _Well, maybe that's what they need to hear. Better coming from you than from someone like Snoke._

She could see his hands now, one battle-scuffed glove curled around her hand as he stroked his daughter's face with the other. Lyndriel smiled in her sleep.

_She knows you're here._

_Of course she does._

_Come home._

She felt deep weariness flood their connection. _I'm doing this to protect her._

Rey thought of Leia, of her reassuring smile and bright but tired eyes. She didn't say anything more. They'd had that argument too many times: how he was running like his father from a responsibility that frightened him, how his sense of duty like his mother’s eclipsed his love for their child.

_She needs to know you before we tell her._

His amusement shimmered through her. _You think she doesn't already know?_ _Why else would she ask for that story, night after night?_

_So come home._

_I will. When-_

The connection faded.

Rey closed her eyes, clinging to the memory of the warmth of him at her back, the tug of his fingers in her hair, his-

But she was a mother now. And a teacher. She couldn’t allow herself to wallow. 

Rey lifted her daughter, and looked across the lake one last time before taking her in to bed.

Veruna was rising now, its reflection in the lake below pointing straight to the constellation of Kira and the non-constellation of her dark prince, as if Rey could walk across it and drag them back down to Naboo. And maybe she would: they'd all been through too much for her to lose her husband to darkness in the Unknown Regions.

_You'd better come back to me, Ben Solo. Or I may just follow you into the stars._

**Author's Note:**

> This story arose from pondering what constellation myths might look like in the Star Wars universe - even in a planet-hopping culture, people would have a need for stories to make sense of their worlds, and generations of storytellers could turn a queen into a goddess.
> 
> That, and I was curious to see how Reylo might look in a canonverse historical AU. :)
> 
>  **References/Inspiration:**  
> [Varykino](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Varykino)  
> [Nightwatcher](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Nightwatcher_worm)  
> [R'iia](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/R%27iia)  
> [Bobbajo the Crittermonger](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Bobbajo)  
> [Shiraya](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Shiraya/Legends)  
> [Cerrabore](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Cerrabore)  
> [Tusk-cat](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Tusk_cat)  
> [Onoam](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Onoam) and [Veruna](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Veruna_\(moon\))
> 
> Thank-you for reading - if you enjoyed it, please drop me a kudos or comment!


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